“You remind me so much of Miss Gertrude and my little lads,” she said at last, with a smile, which was sadder to see than her tears, her much-moved visitor thought. “I don’t often cry, but I couldn’t help it,” and her voice broke again.
“I have just seen them all,” said Mr Sherwood. “They are all at the sea-side, as you know. They are all well; at least little Claude is no worse than usual. Miss Gertrude made me promise to come to see you. She never knew, till she joined Mrs Seaton at the sea-side, how it was with you. And see, she sent you this.”
“I thought she had forgotten me,” said Christie, faintly, as she took, with trembling fingers, a little note he held out to her. She did not read it, however, but lay quite still with her eyes closed, exhausted with her tears and her surprise.
“Mrs Seaton thought you might have gone home by this time,” said Mr Sherwood. “I suppose she did not know you had been so ill. I hope I may tell Miss Gertrude, when I write, that you will soon be well again.”
“I don’t know,” said Christie, slowly. “I hope I am not any worse. I must have patience, I suppose.”
“I have no doubt you are very patient,” said Mr Sherwood, hardly knowing what else to say.
“I try to be patient, but I am restless with the pain sometimes, and the time seems so long. It is not really very long. I came in May, and now it is August; but it seems a long time—longer than all my life before, it sometimes seems.”
Mr Sherwood did not often find himself at a loss for something to say, but he sat silent now. There came into his mind what Christie had said to little Claude in the cedar walk that day, about all things happening for good, and how Jesus, if He saw that it would be best for him, could make the little boy strong and well with a word, as He did the blind man. But it would have seemed to him like mockery to remind her of that now.
For in truth the first sight of the girl had startled him greatly. He had come to the hospital more than half believing that he should find that she had gone home to her friends well. She was greatly changed; he would not have known her if he had met her elsewhere. Her face was perfectly colourless, after the flush which her surprise at seeing him had excited, had passed away; her eyes seemed unnaturally large, and her brow far higher and broader than it used to be; and her hand, lying on the coverlid, seemed almost as white as the little note she held in it. What could he say to her? Not, surely, that she would soon be well again, for it seemed to him that she was past any hope of that.
“You have not read your letter,” he said.